VATICAN CITY (CNS)—Like chaplains in the U.S. military around the
world, a group of Catholic chaplains meeting at the Vatican spent a
full day studying how to provide pastoral and spiritual care to people
suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.

Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio, head of the U.S. Archdiocese for
the Military Services, brought 40 U.S. Catholic chaplains, who are on
active military duty, to the Vatican Jan. 19-21 to discuss what's going
on in the archdiocese, learn more about responding to post-traumatic
stress disorder and discuss preparations for using the new Mass
translations.

Archbishop Broglio said sessions of the annual archdiocesan
priests' convocation are always scheduled in five different cities
around the world; this year, one was held at the Vatican. Unless he is
deployed with troops on a military mission, each chaplain is expected
to attend one of the sessions, the archbishop said.

The chaplains attending the Vatican meeting went to Pope
Benedict XVI's weekly general audience Jan. 20, and Archbishop Broglio
spoke briefly with the pope. The archbishop said he told the pope that
Auxiliary Bishop Richard B. Higgins had recently suffered a heart
attack, and the pope promised his prayers.

Archbishop Broglio said that even though the entire 2008
convocation was dedicated to post-traumatic stress disorder, it is such
"a major problem for men and women in the armed services and for our
own chaplains, who are deployed multiple times," that he decided an
entire day should be dedicated to the topic again.

The key speaker at the Rome meeting was Jesuit Father Richard
Curry, founder and artistic director of the National Theatre Workshop
of the Handicapped and founder of the Writers' Program for Wounded
Warriors. The program helps veterans write dramatic monologues in order
tell their stories and help begin the healing process.

"He is doing tremendous work," the archbishop said, and has
been "immensely successful" in using drama as therapy for members of
the military recovering from the trauma of combat.

Archbishop Broglio said his archdiocese is responsible for the
pastoral care of about 1.5 million Catholics in the military around the
world and in Veterans Affairs hospitals.

With 285 active duty chaplains for the military and about 150
chaplains working in the hospitals, "we are terribly undermanned," he
said.

"Our people come from another diocese and return to another
diocese" once their military service is over, he said, "so they are
only ours for a time."

Anytime one of those dioceses would like to pitch in by lending a priest, the archbishop said he's ready to talk.